Ria VERHAEGHE (b. 1950) is one of the most important artists living and working in Belgium. Her oeuvre spans painting, sculpture, drawing, collage and video. Primarily concerned with giving value to images and photographs of death and tragedies found in newspapers - that are often quickly discarded and forgotten - she also works with flowers, plants and organic materials.

For the last thirty years, Verhaeghe has been assembling an image database called 'Provisoria', in which approximately 60.000 images are ordered according to a personal bookkeeping system (or “matrix”) of keywords, colours, dates and groups. Through this collection, she aims to conserve, present and re-contextualise these images within new frameworks of meaning and significance. The Provisoria collection forms the nucleus of Verhaeghe’s practice. As a mostly self-taught artist, Verhaeghe’s work is heavily influenced by her studies in music history and professional background as a nurse.

Recent paintings from Ria Verhaeghe’s ongoing Verticals series continue to utilise images from the artist’s archive of catalogued newspaper clippings, 'Provisoria'. Verhaeghe transforms images of dead or ‘horizontal’ bodies by layering them with dried leaves, flowers and gold leaf, giving them new life by turning them into radiant Verticals.

Notable solo presentations include: 'SANT2024: Ria Verhaeghe', at the Cultural Centre of Bruges in September 2024; 'Verticals', Installation in the room of Medieval Art, Museum of Fine Arts (MSK), Ghent, Belgium (2022) and 'Alma Matrix, Bracha L. Ettinger and Ria Verhaeghe', Antoni Tapies Foundation, Barcelona, Spain (2010). Selected group presentations include the 5th Biennale of Moscow, Russia (2013) and All our relations, 18th Biennale of Sydney, Australia (2012).